Category Archives: Motorcycle – NY to SP

Day 49 – Bogota – back on the bikes!

What a long day! 

We went to the airport at 11am and finished the process at 7pm!! 
First the cargo company had to cancel some paperwork that said that the bikes were going to be nationalized and create the paperwork for them as personal vehicles in transit.  
In the meantime we had to go from the warehouse to the customs to find out what the process was!! No one the entire day seemed to know what they were supposed to do or what the process was but at least this time we went by car. It is about a 10 minute walk between the warehouse and the customs offices – not to mention that every time we went to the warehouse they wanted us to open up our bags, patted us down and got our IDs.
Back at the warehouse we had to wait for the entire airplane to be unloaded to then get some papers so that we could go back to customs again – walking this time. 
Then a fee popped up – some handling fee! 
We were outraged since we already had paid a fortune for this service in Panama. 
After some back and forth they gave us a small discount – but we had to pay something anyway. 
Off we went to customs then back with two very nice and flirtatious customs ladies who inspected our bikes at the warehouse – by car 🙂
Back to the customs we got more paperwork done, photocopies, and then cleared our papers with the cargo inspectors next to the customs office. 
We thought we were in the clear and happily walked back to the warehouse where we found out that there was yet another inspection that had to be done by a cargo inspector – there were 2 of them in the warehouse. But I had to go back to customs to request an authorization for them to inspect the bike.
By this time I was fuming… charged to the customs building and got them to come to inspect the bikes… 
Back to the warehouse we waited for another eternity for them to fill out paperwork and so on. 
UFF!! So now we were clear to get the bikes out of the warehouse.
“Where is your truck?” 
“What truck!? We’re driving the motorcycles out of here!”
“Oh… don’t know how we’re going to get them down from the loading docks…”
We ended up having to maneuver them through the lobby and down some stairs… it was actually kind of fun 🙂
Our plans to leave Bogota today didn’t go through so we’re back at the same hotel… it’s a record for us in this trip – 3 nights in the same hotel!! 
Tomorrow off to Medellin!!

From Motorcycle NY to SP

Day 49 – Bogota

Still waiting for the bikes… they were supposed to have been here this morning but due to some weather problems the plane landed at 9am instead of 3am… and they will only know if the bikes were actually shipped around 2pm!

Argh!! 

Day 48 – Bogota

So the bikes were not shipped last night so staying another day in
Bogota…

Going to do some tourism around town…

We went to eat at Casa Vieja – a restaurant with regional food – quite tasty – and then walked around the historic part of town called Candelaria. The weather cleared up a little so we took a cable car up to Montserate – which I wonder if the word come from serrated mountain or mountain with fog – anyone?

And here are the photos:

From Motorcycle NY to SP

At night we went out to meet a friend of a friend of Marc’s and had a beer at a local spot in the Center of town… we then went to Zona G looking for Harry’s Bar but no one knew where it was (very strange) and then we went to Zona T where all the bars and restaurants are to grab a bite to eat… Tuesday night so not too much going on… 

Day 47 – Panama City to Bogota

Uff – long day – started out very well with a great breakfast at the hotel then we went straight to the cargo terminal to see about shipping the bikes today through Servi Carga who were a LOT nicer and more helpful that GIRAG and Copa…
Let’s see if it actually gets put on a plane tonight… we’ll have confirmation only tomorrow.
We spent the entire day at the cargo area packing up the bikes and doing the paperwork.
We then went to the passenger terminal and got on the flight to Bogota, Colombia – which we were lucky to get on since the flight was full!
The plane was delayed to depart due to “operational” problems and then because one of the passengers wasn’t feeling well… the captain asked if there was a doctor on board and there was… once the doctor looked at the passenger we finally took off.
The entire plane had a good laugh when the captain explained that the passenger was fit to fly and another passenger said “El tenia calor!” – the guy was hot!
In any case – arrived in Bogota after an hour and tried to decide where to stay – near the airport or in Zona T – a recommendation by a friend of a friend – we got a very nice taxi driver – Alvaro – who very patiently took us around and around and around.
Zona T’s hotels were booked… the hotels near the center of town were pretty bad… so we went all the way back to the hotels near the airport, which were ok…
Uff 🙂

Shipping


Bikes being put on crates 🙂 There is a chance they will go on
tonight's flight otherwise tomorrow night.
And I just got news that the passenger flight was full as well tonight but after a little insisting we got seats to fly to Bogota tonight. Just hope we can get to the flight in time!! We have about 2 hours.

Day 46 1/2 – Panama City

Kind of a wasted day today… in terms of the trip’s progress…
Woke up really early and did laundry at the hotel near the airport we stayed in last night and then we hung around the hotel until check out time since it was raining.
We came into Panama City under mild rain and went to a Radisson Hotel since the guide book said it was the “party” hotel of Panama but they had no rooms. They helped us find another hotel – quite hard since all the hotels were fully booked or outrageously expensive. They finally found a hotel that was so cheap we got suspicious about it.
As we were taking off to check it out the rain started coming down hard again so we decided to check out the shopping mall in front of the hotel and eat a little…
We checked back into the Radisson just in case they had a cancellation and we were told that usually they keep 5 rooms open for emergencies and that the manager was playing by the book and not letting us take one of them… BUT if we waited until around 6pm they would most likely have a cancellation and therefore a room for us.
I went back into the mall to play some video games… hehehe…
I came back and we had a room 🙂
Very nice hotel…
No videos or photos today…
Hopefully tomorrow we’ll be able to ship the bikes… we’re going to Bogota regardless of when the bikes go… we can leave the bikes at the cargo company no problem. So at least we’ll get out of all this rain and be in Bogota which I hear is quite interesting… Any tips?